Seven years is a long time – long enough to transform Clementine from a small-town teenager with a broken heart into a woman ready to take on the world, but not long enough to make her forget about the man she was never suppose to see again. A temporary return to Willow Heights thrusts her back into Donovan’s life and home, unearthing heartbreak and obsession that have stood the test of time.

He left seven years ago too, for war and other things Clementine can only imagine. Coming back to town where he grew up in the shadow of poverty and drug addiction makes no sense, and neither do Clementine’s feelings for him. He could never forgive her for leaving, could he? Even if she had no choice.

Now, she has the freedom to choose…and so does he. Every day in Willow Heights makes it clearer: all he ever really wanted was her, and nothing will change that. Not even a taste of hell that drove them apart in the first place.

My Thoughts

My what a short and sweet little romance this was. It really did have my heartstrings pulled from cover to cover. I never imagined that Trevor would meet his end, I mean I envisioned something happening involving Trevor, Clementine and Donovan but not his death. If anything I thought his demise would be at the hands of Donovan and not Donovan’s friend and co-worker/employee Mike.

I’m really glad and had a teary eyed moment in the end where she and her mother’s relationship finally started to mend together. It’s really an eye opener to how people react and how much it takes for a person to realize their wrong.

I feel Trevor fully deserved what he got, and that justice was fully served for Clementine and the others that weren’t as lucky as Clementine to get away.

This novel highlighted the fact that true love can and will withstand the tests of time and anything that life has to throw at it. Novels like this give my big romantic sappy heart that something like this will one day happen for all of us.

I wasn’t disappointed with this novel, it was a truly a feel-good romance and I look forward to reading more works from Ranae Rose.

I’ve got another review for you today, I know I haven’t been as active this month, but I hope to be with work finally settling back into an equal pace. This will be my first review for an Arc from NetGalley, so without further adieu…

Why wearing red shoes makes a girl a harlot
Why a shop would ever sell something called “buck urine”
Why everywhere she goes, she runs into sexy-and infuriating-Brendan King

After losing her job, her apartment, and her boyfriend, Paige has no choice but to leave Philadelphia and move in with her retired parents. For an artsy outsider like Paige, finding her place in a tightly knit town isn’t easy-until she meets Brendan, the hot mechanic who’s interested in much more than Paige’s car. In no time at all, Brendan helps Paige find a new job, new friends, and a happiness she wasn’t sure she’d ever feel again. With Brendan by her side, Paige finally feels like she can call Mirabelle home. But when a new bombshell drops, will the couple survive or will their love come undone?

My Thoughts

What a lovely feel-good novel this was. I don’t exactly know where to begin with my thoughts. The whole novel was like a movie playing in my head, for one because you can picture yourself in the setting of Mirabelle and place yourself in Paige’s shoes as being the outsider in a small town. The novel was humorous in most spots, so much so that I was told to stop “cackling” roughly around midnight. But it was also sad in others like with the death of her father. It was a tear jerker both happy tears and sad tears.

The main characters were your typical – girl meets boy, boy and girl fall in love, boy loses girl, boy gets girl back and they live happily ever after – couple. < This most of the time isn’t a bad thing and wasn’t in this case. Paige and Brendan had their share of flaws and skeletons in their closet, and were easily relatable as I mentioned above. I could place myself in Paige’s shoes.

In the beginning I never would have guessed that Brendan would get her a job working in a funeral home, that had been a twist I wasn’t expecting at all. It did end up working out for her in the end and she actually enjoyed working with what she did. I also didn’t expect her father to pass away with cancer. That plot twist was a blinding, mostly because how the author introduced it into the plot was subtle but out of the blue – like all of the sudden he wasn’t feeling well and had pain and the only one who noticed had been Brendan. I don’t know about Pancreatic cancer from personal experience and each instance could be different but when a family member of mine had cancer you could tell there was something wrong, it slowly got more noticeable. They should had been able to notice but in the defense of Paige and her mum, they probably didn’t know the signs that started to show that he had cancer.

All in all it was a very good read and I’m excited to read all about Jax and Grace’s relationship…hopefully in the second book.